Pleistocene porcupine (Erethizontidae) records in arid southwestern North America and comparisons with the modern distribution of Erethizon dorsatum in southern California and Arizona
Jeffrey E. Lovich, George T. Jefferson
2025, Western North American Naturalist (85)
he North American porcupine (Erethizon dorsatum) is widely distributed throughout many ecosystems on the continent from northern Mexico to the Arctic Ocean, except for the southeastern portion of the United States. Habitats include the arid Desert Southwest region where modern records are generally sparse. The paleogeographic range in the Desert...
Elevation mediates juvenile steelhead demographic response to stream temperature and flow
Ryan A. Vosbigian, Alexa Ballinger, Timothy E. Link, Timothy Copeland, Matthew Richard Falcy
2025, Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (82)
Climate change alters streams by modifying flow dynamics, temperature, and biotic communities, changing the habitat where stream dwelling fish have evolved. We used snorkel survey data spanning four decades to investigate how juvenile steelhead (anadromous Oncorhynchus mykiss) counts and size structure were influenced by stream temperature and flow....
Advancing current understanding of Martian impact-generated hydrothermal systems through novel coupled modeling: Insights from Gale, Jezero, and other craters
Alexander J. Trowbridge, Simone Marchi, Joshua M. Taron, Gordon R. Osinski
2025, Journal of Geophysical Research - Planets (130)
Impact-generated hydrothermal systems are considered potentially habitable environments on Mars, Earth, and other planetary bodies for microbial life. However, there is an ongoing debate regarding what geological features on Mars provide definitive evidence for such systems. Although earlier studies have modeled hydrothermal processes in Martian craters, they often lacked integration...
The geology of Canadian potash: A critical mineral for feeding the world
E.J. Matheson, Mark D. Cocker, M. E. Snyder, Craig Funk, R. Boehner, Chaowei Yang, M.P.B. Nicolas, N. W. Kruger
2025, Facets (10) 1-40
Potash, potassium-bearing water-soluble salt, is the primary global economic source of potassium. Potash is recognized as a critical mineral in Canada as it is the largest source of potassium used in fertilizers. It is essential for global agricultural productivity and food security. Canada is the world’s largest...
Speciation genomics in the tiger whiptail lizards (Aspidoscelis tigris complex)
Anthony J. Barley, David V. Ho, Peter Baumann, Ian J. Wang, H. Bradley Shaffer, Robert N. Fisher, Levi N. Gray, Trevor J. Krabbenhoft, Robert E. Espinoza, Merly Escalona, Erin Toffelmier, Ruta Sahasrabudhe, Oanh Nguyen, Colin W. Fairbairn, Eric Beraut, Robert C. Thomson
2025, Genome Biology and Evolution (17)
The transition from small genetic to genome-scale datasets for studying biodiversity has revealed that genetic exchange through introgressive hybridization is a widespread phenomenon in nature. Despite this, a lack of high-quality reference genomes for most non-model species limits our understanding of the impact of this process for...
Hydrogeologic characterization of the Cahuilla Valley and Terwilliger Valley Groundwater Basins, Riverside County, California
Christina L. Stamos, Allen H. Christensen, Geoffrey Cromwell, Meghan C. Dick, Christopher P. Ely, Elizabeth R. Jachens, Sarah E. Ogle, Mackenzie M. Shepherd
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5073
The relation between the groundwater and the amount of natural recharge to the Cahuilla Valley and Terwilliger Valley groundwater basins is not well understood. During the 20th century, the reliance on groundwater near Anza, California, used for agricultural, domestic, and municipal reasons has increased, and there is the potential for...
Integrating theory and empirical patterns: Fish body size distributions, life history traits, and environmental flows in streams
Taylor Woods, Daniel J. McGarvey, Matthew J. Cashman, Michael R. Meador, Daren M. Carlisle, Ken Eng, Darin A. Kopp, Kelly O. Maloney
2025, Science Advances (11)
Individual size distributions (ISDs) are prominent in ecological research and may support resource managers with ecosystem-scale objectives. We use a database of individual size measurements for US stream fishes to test for direct and indirect effects of traits, flow regimes, and land use on the interspecific ISD exponent. Path analysis...
Landscape associations and population genetics of a generalist carnivore at a range limit
Bailey A. Kleeberg, Robert Charles Lonsinger, Jennifer R. Adams, Lisette P. Waits, W. Sue Fairbanks
2025, PLoS ONE (20)
American black bear (Ursus americanus) sightings have increased in the Oklahoma Panhandle, an area outside of the species’ historical range, prompting an assessment of bears in the region. We used camera traps and an occupancy modeling framework to identify factors influencing bear detection and space-use patterns. We used noninvasive genetic...
A comprehensive geologic framework of the National Crustal Model for seismic hazard studies in the conterminous United States
Oliver S. Boyd, Donald S. Sweetkind
2025, Lithosphere (2025)
A three-dimensional (3D) geologic framework has been developed for the conterminous United States (U.S.) as part of the U.S. Geological Survey National Crustal Model to enhance seismic hazard modeling. The geologic framework is created from geologic maps and multiple subsurface geologic unit boundaries including the base of the Miocene, Cenozoic,...
USGS Flow Photo Explorer is still going and growing!
Jennifer H. Fair
2025, Newsletter
The Flow Photo Explorer (FPE) platform continues to grow rapidly as a national resource for using imagery to monitor environmental conditions. As of early December 2025, FPE now supports more than 350 users, operating across more than 600 monitoring sites. The database has expanded to over 12 million images, 800,000 annotations, and approximately 160 trained models, reflecting...
Dynamic risk from Mexican wolves and mountain lions influences elk foraging behavior
Julia E. Olson, Cara J. Thompson, Zachary J. Farley, Samuel I. Martinez, Scott T. Boyle, Nicole M. Tatman, James C. DeVos, Stewart D. Liley, James W. Cain III
2025, Ecology and Evolution (15)
Foraging time is a major component of ungulate activity budgets but can be limited by anti-predator behaviors (e.g., vigilance). Multitasking can reduce the nutritional costs of vigilance under heightened predation risk, but this may depend on the response of prey to risk from multiple predators across a...
Assessing streams in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed to guide conservation and restoration activities
Kelly O. Maloney, Rosemary M. Fanelli, Matthew J. Cashman, Lindsey J. Boyle, Stephanie E. Gordon, Benjamin P. Gressler, Michelle P. Katoski, Alexander H. Kiser, Marina J. Metes, Gregory E. Noe, Andrew J. Sekellick, Allison Sussman, John A. Young
2025, Fact Sheet 2025-3056
Freshwater streams in the Chesapeake Bay watershed are home to numerous aquatic organisms (like fish, amphibians, mussels, and insects) and provide drinking water and recreational opportunities to people living in or visiting the watershed. Land-use changes, such as urban development and increased activities in certain agricultural sectors, have degraded water...
Multi-temporal surface water mapping with high-resolution elevation and image data through weakly supervised deep learning
Larry Stanislawski, Rongjun Qin, Jung-Kuan Liu, Ethan J. Shavers, Shaowen Wang, Nattapon Jaroenchai, Philip T. Thiem
2025, Conference Paper, Abstracts of the International Cartographic Association
Monitoring the extent of surface water features (hydrography), accurately storing them in databases, and representing them on topographic maps are essential for various applications such as navigation and policy-making for legislative boundaries and permitting. In this context, hydrographic data includes features that generally have water present or image data showing...
Mitigation of human cognitive bias in volcanic eruption forecasting
Heather M. Wright, J. D. Pesicek, Stephen A. Spiller
2025, Journal of Applied Volcanology (14)
Modern operational eruption forecasting methods rely heavily on human judgment in the face of uncertainty and are thus susceptible to myriad cognitive biases and errors by the scientist-forecasters. Recent developments in the behavioral sciences have elucidated cognitive biases across a wide spectrum of human behaviors and found ways to mitigate...
An exploration of open-system uranium-series history of marine terrace corals, Perachora Peninsula, Greece and San Nicolas Island, California, USA
Daniel R. Muhs, Claudio Vita-Finzi, R. Randall Schumann
2025, Quaternary Science Reviews (370)
Emergent marine terraces record past periods of relatively high sea level and are common on uplifting coasts worldwide. Such landforms are extensive around the Gulf of Corinth area of Greece and along the coast of California, USA. In the Gulf of Corinth region, marine terraces record Quaternary...
The transition from melt accumulation to eruption initiation recorded by orthopyroxene Fe-Mg diffusion timescales in late Holocene rhyolites, South Sister volcano, Oregon Cascade Range
Nathan Lee Andersen, Annika E. Dechert, Dawn Catherine Sweeney Ruth, May (Mai) Sas, Julie Chouinard, Josef Dufek
2025, Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (26)
South Sister volcano, Oregon Cascade Range, USA, has repeatedly erupted rhyolite since ca. 40 ka. The youngest such eruptions are the ca. 2 ka Rock Mesa and Devils Chain rhyolites, erupted several hundred years apart from two multi-vent complexes separated by 3–6 km. Fe-Mg interdiffusion models of orthopyroxene rims from both...
Post-wildfire sediment fluxes and turbidity plumes in a coastal-draining watershed
Amanda M. Lopez, Tesfa W. Meshesha, Christine M. Lee, Ibrahim N. Mohammed, Erin L. Hestir, Thomas C. Harmon, Dulcinea Marie Avouris
2025, Earth and Space Science (12)
Coastal watersheds impacted by wildfires experience higher erosion resulting in increased sediment delivery to the ocean that alters limiting factors (i.e., light) for marine organisms. With increasing wildfire magnitude and severity, it is critical to explore changes in riverine discharges to the ocean to assess cascading hazards associated with wildfires....
Using gridded seismicity to forecast the long-term spatial distribution of earthquakes for the 2025 Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands National Seismic Hazard Model
Andrea L. Llenos, Andrew J. Michael, Kirstie Lafon Haynie, Allison Shumway, Julie A. Herrick
2025, Seismological Research Letters
Gridded (or background) seismicity models are a critical component of probabilistic seismic hazard assessments, accounting for off‐fault and smaller‐magnitude earthquakes. They are typically developed by declustering and spatially smoothing an earthquake catalog to estimate a long‐term seismicity rate that can be used to forecast future earthquakes. Here, we present new...
Advancements in satellite observations of inland and coastal waters: Building towards a global validation network
Dulcinea Marie Avouris, Fernanda Maciel, Samantha L. Sharp, Susanne E. Craig, Arnold G. Dekker, Courtney A. Di Vittorio, John R. Gardner, Emma C. Goldsmith, Juan I. Gossn, Steven R. Greb, Brice K. Grunert, Daniela Gurlin, Mahesh Jampani, Rabia M. Khan, Ben Lowin, Lachlan McKinna, Colleen B. Mouw, Igor Ogashawara, Sara Rivero Calle, Wilson B. Salls, Joan-Albert Sanchez-Cabeza, Blake Schaeffer, Bridget N. Seegers, Jari Silander, Emily A. Smail, Menghua Wang, P. Jeremy Werdell
2025, Remote Sensing (17)
The use of satellite-based remote sensing imagery for water quality monitoring of inland and coastal waters has become widespread over the last few decades, with the expansion of, and investment in, operational Earth-observing missions. Satellite-based sensors are uniquely suited to provide synoptic, system-wide water quality parameter estimates that supplement traditional...
Streamflow as a stressor: Disentangling hydrology and water quality impacts to characterize flow-ecology relationships for two stream assemblages across two southeastern landscapes
Joshua Paul Hubbell
2025, Ecohydrology (18)
Disassociating the independent effects of flow and water quality on the ecology of flowing waters is an overarching goal in water resource science needed to improve the efficacy of watershed management. However, the interrelatedness of these gradients and their subsequent alteration due to land use change has constrained progress made...
High frequency and region-scale simulations of large (Mw7+) earthquakes on the southern Whidbey Island fault, Washington, USA
Ian P. Stone, Erin A. Wirth, Alex R. Grant, Arthur D. Frankel
2025, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America
We simulate ground shaking in western Washington State from hypothetical Mw7.0–7.5 earthquakes on the southern Whidbey Island fault (SWIF). Ground motions are modeled considering kinematic source distributions on a complex fault plane, a 3D seismic velocity model, and region‐specific soil velocity models. We run simulations with varying model resolutions, including...
Offsetting the noise: A framework for applying phenological offset corrections in remotely sensed burn severity assessments
Casey Elizabeth Menick, Melanie K. Vanderhoof, Joshua J. Picotte, Alicia L. Reiner, Robert A. Chastain
2025, International Journal of Wildland Fire (34)
BackgroundPhenological correction of pre- and post-fire imagery is used to improve remotely sensed burn severity evaluations. Unburned offset values standardize greenness between image pairs; however, efficacy across diverse scenarios remains underexplored.AimsWe evaluated the impact of phenological offset correction methods to support analyst decision-making across fire-prone environments.MethodsWe generated...
Similar population dynamics before and after a chytridiomycosis outbreak in a tropical riparian amphibian species
Graziella Vittoria DiRenzo, Rebecca M. McCaffery, Ana V. Longo, Kelly R. Zamudio, Karen R. Lips
2025, Ecosphere (16)
Emerging infectious diseases can cause rapid, widespread host mortality, and the lack of demographic data before and after pathogen emergence complicates understanding mechanisms of host persistence. This challenge is further compounded by environmental conditions that influence host behavior, while driving pathogen growth and virulence. These interactions create complex disease outcomes...
Gas chemistry and isotope data for volcano monitoring at the Lassen Volcanic Center, Lassen Volcanic National Park
Deborah Bergfeld, Jennifer L. Lewicki, Sara Peek, Andrew G. Hunt
2025, Open-File Report 2025-1056
This report presents chemical and isotopic compositions of volcanic gases collected from thermal areas within Lassen Volcanic National Park in northern California from 1974 through 2019. As the southernmost volcano in the Cascade Range and designated a very-high-threat volcano by the U.S. Geological Survey, the Lassen Volcanic Center (LVC) requires...
Getting ahead of the crises: Developing an avian malaria disease management plan for Hawaiian forest birds
Eben H. Paxton, Eldridge Naboa, Nicholas R. Agorastos, Donna L. Ball, Lucas Berio Fortini, Thomas Cady, Richard J. Camp, Patrick J. Hart, Springer Kaye, Steven J. Kendall, Dennis A. LaPointe, Ricardo D. Lopez, Katherine Maria McClure, Amanda K Navine
2025, Conservation Science and Practice (8)
Avian malaria is an existential threat to a majority of native Hawaiian forest birds. Climate change is facilitating the spread of malaria to historically disease-free areas, and despite the risk of native Hawaiian forest bird extinctions from malaria outbreaks, no comprehensive disease management plans exist for forest...
